Ex-Brighton Resident Charged With Stealing $755K From Property Management Company

A bookkeeper was indicted Monday for syphoning more than $750,000 from a Brooklyn property management company and using the stolen funds to pay down mortgages and maintain her own properties in Syracuse, according to the Brooklyn District Attorney.

Jennifer De Coteau Ulanov, 44, a former resident of Brighton Beach who now lives in Syracuse, according to the DA, is accused of taking checks made out to her employer, Guardian Property Management, and depositing them into her personal bank account. Prosecutors hit Ulanov with a 34-count indictment for ripping off the company whose finances she was entrusted to manage.

“This defendant allegedly used her employer here in Brooklyn as a personal piggy bank by stealing a staggering amount of money from several company bank accounts and then investing the stolen money into her own properties upstate. She will now be held accountable for this elaborate scheme to defraud,” Brooklyn DA Ken Thompson said in a press release.

Ulanov was the sole employee of Guardian Property Management, a Park Slope-based company owned by a husband and wife, according to prosecutors. Guardian manages small to mid-size rentals, cooperatives and condominiums located in Park Slope, Williamsburg, Sunset Park and other Brooklyn neighborhoods

The indictment alleges that Ulanov stole more than $755,000 from the company between 2010 and 2014. She is accused of forging signatures on checks from her employer and tenants and depositing the money into her own bank account. Ulanov also allegedly diverted client fees to herself and covered up the paper trail by the company’s bank statements and balance sheets.

The money was used to keep up six of Ulanov’s own properties in Syracuse, prosecutors say.